Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a heating system of a hybrid vehicle in which the heat generated from an engine is stored in various electronic devices and the cooling lines thereof to be used as a heating source in the hybrid vehicle.
Description of Related Art
Generally, a hybrid vehicle is driven by selecting one of an engine driving force using a fossil fuel and a motor driving force using electrical energy, or by using both of them.
That is, a hybrid vehicle implements an engine driving mode where a vehicle is driven using only an engine driving source, an electric vehicle (EV) driving mode where a vehicle is driven using only a motor driving source, and a hybrid electric vehicle (HEV) driving mode where a vehicle is driven using both powers from an engine and a motor in accordance with the driving situations.
In the hybrid vehicle an interior heating system, as shown in FIG. 1, is provided with a heater core 1, an engine 3, an engine cooling loop 10 that is connected to a radiator 7 such that cooling water is circulated, and an electronic device cooling loop 20 that is separately prepared to be connected to various front components 23 and an auxiliary radiator 27 for cooling them such that cooling water is circulated.
According to the conventional heating system for a hybrid vehicle as configured above, the heat generated from an engine is transferred toward the heater core when a heating operation is needed on a driving mode to heat the interior of a vehicle. Even in a case where the driving mode is converted into the EV driving mode where a vehicle is driven using only motor when an engine stops, the interior of a vehicle is heated using the heat remained in the engine for a predetermined time, however, the engine needs to be re-started in accordance with the decreasing of the temperature of the engine.
Further, even though heat is generated through various electronic devices such as an inverter while a vehicle is driven on the EV driving mode, the heat is thrown out due to the cooling thereby to cause energy loss and further the heat generated as the temperature increases is cooled to be thrown out.
A separate heat storage system has been proposed in order to store the thrown out heat, however, separate structures have to be added so as to establish the heat storage system, thereby making the structure complicated and increasing unit costs.
The information disclosed in this Background of the Invention section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.